Love Me, Hate Me, I’m Just Me on FB.

I have an infectious personality. Others would consider it diseased. I have spent much of my life – wondering on what side of the fence most people fall. Am I too loud and obnoxious for some? But then also the perfect mixture of humor and craziness for others?

It is no secret that I have a very polarizing personality. You either love me or hate me – there’s not really an in-between. And I spent much of my twenties determined to encourage all the people to like me all the time.

And that is exhausting. 

It WAS exhausting.

It is exhausting trying to be all the things to all the people – especially when it’s all said and done – some people may still not like me anyways. And social media has become one of the biggest catalysts and avenues for judgment, catty commentary, and strong-willed opinions.

On this journey to being me, I have learned a few things along the way (about myself and others) when it comes to social media:

I’m not egotistical, I’m just confident.

 Sharing a zillion selfies? Check. Putting together outfits and standing together in front of a brick wall? Check. Talking about my day or writing about building confidence? Check. I spent way too long not loving all of me and worrying about what everyone and their mother thought of me. I share those things for myself, not you, not for anyone else. Like it, love it, comment it, ignore it, unfollow me, block that – I can’t spend time worrying about your judgment of something so silly as a Facebook post or Instagram shot. I’ve got all the things to do.

Positive begets positive

I’ve heard it often – “Social media only shows you 5% of a person’s life – don’t worry – they are only showing you the really great parts, not the yuck stuff.” I could write transparently. I could tell you all about how sometimes my patience with my kids has worn off by 6:45 am. I could moan about all the things in my life that are worth changing, but that I refuse to change. But if there is one thing I have learned, positivity reaps positivity. Put toxic, negative energy into the air and you will reap that ten-fold. Your complaints are valid, but when all you have are complaints? Perhaps you need to reassess the good that is in your life. Are you breathing? Do you have a home? Do you sometimes rock the fashion game? Then I think you’re doing alright. Stop wondering why all the bad things happen to you when all you do is focus on the negative. Change yo’ life.

Not everything in life is a competition

When something awesome happens to someone and they share it, that’s a GREAT thing – even if it didn’t happen to you. When someone takes a picture of themselves and it looks like something out of a magazine, don’t let that envy rear its head – think WOW! Look how flipping adorable they are and go about your merry way. When someone posts for the 100th time that they are killin’ it at the gym game, don’t be annoyed – celebrate with them that they take their health seriously and mean it. Don’t passively aggressively withhold a comment or like just because “I would never want them to know that I may actually LIKE what they are doing or condone their constant positive Facebook postings” (and don’t lie, you know you’ve done it. We’ve ALL withheld a comment or like for that very reason).

The refusal to talk about hot-button issues on social media does not equal apathy

You won’t see much from me regarding politics this season on Facebook. I learned my lesson a long time ago – growing up in the church and going to law school and blogging and now in public relations has shown me two things: 1. I have a lot of different friends with a lot of different backgrounds who have a lot of different opinions and 2. I will never agree with all of them all the time. So I keep my mouth zipped. Does that mean I don’t care? Because I won’t share a sound bite or a recap on a political candidate for the 85th time? Nope. It just means for me, I haven’t found my personal social media channels to be the avenue for that. You do you and I’ll do me – over here sharing about selfies and what I had for dinner.

Social media has been one of the more fascinating developments of our time, but as with anything, we have spent SO MUCH TIME dissecting the negative Nancys and why they put a damper on everyone’s parade. If you want to share one million pictures of your kid, go for it. If you take a selfie and duck face and use a selfie stick, rock that thang. You want to put all the positive vibes and energy into that space? You do you. Because I would rather see my feed filled to brim with that than see the same arguments over and over again about politics, Pokemon, positivity.

And if you’re one of those who is easily annoyed by those things?

There’s an unfollow button for that.